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A PORTRAIT OF LINCOLN RESTING AGAINST THE FLAG. 
The iiiily ilei-oriition of llie Oluircli at this Mieetinic. 



1809 February 12lh 1909 

Services in Commemoration oi the 

One Hundredth Anniversary 

of the Birth of 

Abraham Lincoln 

Arranged by Union and 
Confederate Veterans 

Under the Ansplces of O. M. Mitchel Post 
No. 1, Grand Army ol the Repoblic 



Trinity Methodist Episcopal Church 

South 

Atlanta, Georgia 

Sunday Evening, February 14th, 1909 



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Published by "Blue" and "Gray" Veterans, 1909 



BYRD PRINTING CO. , ATLANTA. 



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PROGRAM 




D. 1. CARSON. CHAPLAIN 

OF 0. M. MITCHEL POST No. 1, G. A. R. 

PRESIDING 




Organ Prelude 





GEORGIA SAYS ! 

Vote for Past Department Commander W. M. SCOTT, of Georgia, 
For junior VICE-COMMANDER-IN-CHIEF. 

Born on Island of Mackinaw, Michigan. 

Enlisted in Augusc, iS6i; private Co. B, 13th Wisconsin. 

Mustered out September, 1S65, Green Lake, Texas. 

Sergeant-Major, Adjutant of his Regiment and A. A. A. G. 

No man in the South has done more for the Grand Army than Comrade 
Scott. His purse is always open to aid the widows and orphans of comrades, 
and in looking after the graves of the 60 thousand of our dead who are buried 
at Marietta, Andersonville, Buford and Columbia. No one has been more gen- 
erous than he has been for these many years - in the work. 

This position, by right, should be given a Southern Department. 



Address . . . Rev. James W. Lee, D. D. 

Hymn— "My Country 'tis of Thee" - - Congregation 

Benediction 



PROGRAM 



. D. I. CARSON, Chaplain 

OF 0. M. MITCHEL POST No. 1 , G. A. R. 

PRESIDING 



Organ Prelude 

Music .... Choir of Trinity Church 

Reading the Scripture 
Rev. A. F. Sherrill, D.D., Dean of Atlanta Theological Seminary 

Prayer 

General Clement A. Evans, 

Commander in Chief United Confederate Veterans 

Reading Mr. Lincoln's Favorite Poem 

"O, Why Should the Spirit of Mortal be Proud" 

Col. T. H. Jones, Camp A., Wheeler's Cavalry 

Reading "The Gettysburg Address" 
Brig. Gen. J. W. Scully, U. S. Army retired 

Address . . . Rev. James W. Lee, D. D. 

Hymn — "My Country 'tis of Thee" - - Congregation 

Benediction 



FOREWORD. 




HIS PAMPHLET contains a verbatim 
report of the proceedings at one of the 
most miique and patriotic meetings 
ever held in Atlanta. 

An order was received by 0. M. 
Mitchel Post No. 1 from the National 
Headquarters of the Grand Army of the Republic 
tlirough the Headquarters of the Department of 
Georgia and South Carolina, directing, with refer- 
ence to the one hundredth anniversary of the birth 
of Abraham Lincoln, February 12th, 1909, "That 
''every Post shall recognize the day in some fitting 
''manner, either in special meeting or in attendance 
"as a body where a public celebration is held." 

This order having been read at the meeting of 
the Post on January 22, 1909, a Committee was 
appointed, consisting of the Commander, M. F. 
Bernhardt, the Chaplain, D. I. Carson, and Past 
Department Commander, C. F. Fairbanks, to 
arrange for a Commemorative Service thus indi- 
cated. 

Rev. James W. Lee, D. D., Pastor of Trinity 
Methodist Episcopal Church, South, was invited to 
deliver the address. He cordially consented to do so, 
and agreed that the meeting should be held in his 
church. 



An invitation was sent by the Committee to the 
five Camps of Confederate Veterans in the City of 
Atlanta, viz: 

Athmta Camp No. 159, 

Camp A, "Wheeler's Cavalry, 

Camp W. IL T. Walker, No. 925, 

Camp Stonewall Jackson, No. 1581, 

Camp Tige Anderson, No. 1455. 
The camps responded most cordially. Invitations 
were also sent to the Confederate Soldiers' Home, 
and to officers of the United States Army at the 
Headquarters of the Department of the Gulf. 

The following editorials appeared in the Georgian 
of February 13th, and in the Constitution of 
February 14th. 



ALL UNDER ONE FLAG NOW. 

Significant of something more than an interchange of formal 
courtesies is the acceptance by the local camps of Confederate 
Veterans of the invitation extended by the 0. M. Mitchel Post of 
the Grand Army of the Republic to attend the memorial exercises 
in honor of Mr. Lincoln, to be held at Trinity Methodist Church 
on Sunday evening next. 

The Georgian is uncompromisingly devoted to the traditions 
of the South. 

On all the radiant pages wliich recall the storj- of the greatest 
war of modern times there is nothing of which the South has 
rea.son to blush. 

And no deeper or truer lessons in patriotism can be taught to 
the yi>uth cf tlie jiuid in eillicr section than are taught by the 

8 



examples of fortitude and by the illustrations of fidelity to prin- 
ciple which illuminate the Confederate annals. 

But there is something fairly inspiring in this burial of sec- 
tional bitterness — in this death-knell to feudal animosities — in 
this splendid plea for national fraternity and good will. 

Upon the memorial exercises in honor of Mr. Lincoln no less 
a representative of the heroic remnant of Lee's army than General 
Clement A. Evans, the commander-in-chief of the United Confed- 
erate Veterans, will offer the divine invocation. 

It was this gallant soldier who, in the last charge of battle at 
Appomattox, commanded Gordon's immortal division and won an 
incidental victory on the same field which witnessed the furling 
of the conquered banner. 

Colonel T. H. Jones, Avho was an officer in Wheeler's cavalry, 
will read Mr. Lincoln's favorite poem. 

The address of the occasion will be delivered by Dr. James W. 
Lee, the distinguished pastor of the church; and Dr. Lee, both in 
his sympathies and in his antecedents, is typically Southern. He 
was too young to shoulder a musket; but his devotion to the cause 
which rose without shame and which fell without dishonor is 
known and read of all men. 

Yet the theme of Dr. Lee's eloquent eulogium on Sunday even- 
ing will be Abraham Lincoln. 

Feebler and fainter are growing the bitter memories. Like the 
echoes of the bugle-horn, the answer which they return is Dying! 
Dying! Dying! And let them die, for the roses of battle borrow 
no fragrance from the thorns! — Georgian. 



ATLANTA'S SIGNIFICANT TRIBUTE TO LINCOLN. 

In the many hundreds of celebrations the country over inci- 
dent to the centennial of the birth of Abraham Lincoln, there are 
none which can compare in uniqueness or significance to that 
which, at Trinity church, in Atlanta, tonight will bring together 



in oominon cause to honor the memory of the great American, the 
veterans both of the bhie and the gray. 

Uncjuestioiiably in many of tliese {gatherings there have assem- 
bled men and women of the South with those of the North and 
East and West; but here in a Southern city which the fortunes of 
war reduced to ashes will the sun'ivoi-s upon both sides of that 
contlict. who knew of its bitterness and miseries, come toi^ether 
to honor the memory of him who was commander-in-chief of the 
invading army. 

Side by side the iiiemhers of tiie Atlanta camps, United Con- 
federate Veterans, will join with those of the Grand Army of 
the Republic, 0. M. Mitchel Post No. 1, in tribute to Uncoln, the 
man, the American. General Clement A. Evans, commander-in- 
chief of the United Confederate Veterans, will offer the opening 
prayer, followed by the reading of Lincoln's ''Gettysburg Ad- 
dress," by General J. W. Scully, United States army, retired. 
Other veterans of North and South will alteniate upon the pro- 
gram, and Rev. J. W. Lee will deliver the memorial address. 

There could be no liigher, more glorious evidence of a triumph- 
antly restored nationalism. 

Perhaps in no other nation of the world, within less tlian half 
a century after the extreme bitterness of ci\il conllict had been 
implanted in everj' breast, would such a gathering as this, in 
tribute to the leader of the conquering armies, be possible. 

Animosities and prejudices must have disappeared when the 
defeated voluntarily unite in praise of him who, more than any 
other, had to do with the victory achieved. 

Even the esteem and admiration in which men of the South, 
back to those who fought its battles, have always held the war 
President could not have sufficed to make .such celebration pos- 
sible, had it not been for the victory of fraternal spirit over the 
deep-rooted enmities of civil strife. 

In this the South's victory is greatest, for it had not only to 
erase the eiunities of war, but to crush and blot out the rankling 
bitterness of defeat. 

IIow well and nobly it ha.s done this could not he better evi- 
denced than in the nuitual tribute which Confederate .survivors, 
together with those who stood in opposing ranks, will pay tonight 
to the most generous of enemies and the most abiding of friends, 

10 



Abraham Lincoln belongs to the whole United States. 

His work was not sectional, but national, and that is the view 
which now, less than half a centuiy following his tragic death, 
is almost full gi'own. 

The celebration at Trinity church is timely in its conception 
and in its expression of the spirit of today — a spirit in which 
hand and heart unite in significance of the supi'emacy of the 
brotherhood of man. — Constitution. 

The following reports were printed in the papers 
of February 15th. 

Trinity church was packed to capacity last night by the vet- 
ans of the blue and the gray, their friends and relatives, wlio 
gathered to join in this unusual union service commemorating the 
birthday of Abraham Lincoln, which was generally celebrated 
throughout the United States on Friday,, February 12. 

The exercises were decidedly the most interesting ever con- 
ceived in this city, and were unique in the annals of Atlanta. 

So great was the interest in the service that eveiy seat in the 
church was taken and several hundred people turned away for 
lack of space. The Confederate and Union veterans marched 
into the church together and took seats in front of the pulpit. 

Dr. James W. Lee, a gifted speaker, and pastor of Trinity 
Methodist church, was selected as the orator for the occasion, and 
the panegyric pronounced upon the martyred President is one of 
the finest speeches Dr. Lee has ever made. 

A true son of the South, he was not one whit untrue to his 
birth and beliefs, yet did full justice to the man in whose honor 
the meeting was held. 

General Evans Takes Part. 

Another most interesting figure at this wonderful gathering 
was that of General Clement A. Evans, commanding the United 
Confederate Veterans, who, as well as anyone else, had a cause 
to know Lincoln, for it was during the latter's life that he first 
won his spurs as a daring and dashing officer of the Confederacy. 

11 



He led the opening prayer, and it was as simple as it was 
swc*et, and gave the entire services an atmosphere which was felt 
by all. 

The program, which was carried out as printed, was arranged 
by a joint committee from the Confederate Veterans' Camps of 
the city and 0. M. Mitchel Post No. 1, of the Grand Army of the 
liopiiblic, and held under the auspices of the last named or- 
ganization. 

Sharing in point of honor the position taken in the services 
by General Evans was Brigadier General Scully, United States 
army, retired, who read Lincoln' "Gettysburg Address." 

Speaking of the controversy which has arisen concerning the 
preparation of this address, General Scully said he was on the 
train which carried Lincoln from Baltimore to Gettysburg, and 
that he sa\v Lincoln writing an article which he believed to be the 
famous Gettysburg speech. 

The choir of this church, composed of some of Atlanta's 
sweetest singers, had prepared a delightful progi-am, which was 
rendered during the services. The entire audience joined in, 
with spirit, the singing of the concluding hvinn, "My Country 'Tis 
of Thee," which marked the complete reunion of those present. 

At the conclusion of Dr. Lee's address Dr. M. J. Cofer rose 
and moved that the congregation extend to the orator a rising 
vote of thanks. This was done. — Constitution. 



BLUE AND GRAY PAY LINCOLN TRIBUTE. 



Unjwi'k Skiuices Were Held Sunday Evening at Trinity 
Church. — Dr. Lee's Splendid Address. 



One of the most unique sen-iees that has been chronicled since 
the days of the Civil War was that which called together, at 
Trinity Church in Atlanta, Sunday evening, the local veterans of 
the Blue with those of the Gray, in observance of the centenary 
of Abraham Lincoln's birth. 

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Every seat in the church was taken. Those reserved for the 
veterans, immediately in front of the altar, were hardly sufl&eient 
for them when they entered in a body. All the other seats were 
filled, with families and relatives and friends of the veterans 
themselves. The large auditorium of the church was taxed to 
its capacity to hold the concourse of people. 

General Clement A. Evans, commander-in-chief of the United 
Confederate Veterans, was a conspicuous figure of the ceremonial. 
It was he who pronounced the opening prayer — a simple and 
brief invocation of the Almighty's blessing. It was he, too, who 
as a young man more than forty yeare ago, had good reason to 
know that Lincoln lived, when as a brigadier general he fought 
valorously with Gordon, Georgia's chieftain, in the valley of 
Virginia. 

Another conspicuous figure was Brigadier General J. W. 
Scully, U. S. A., retired, who read Lincoln's "Gettysburg Ad- 
dress." 

Dr. Lee's Address. 

Dr. James W. Lee, pastor of Trinity, delivered the panegyi-ic 
on Lincoln that featured the occasion, and which is probably one 
of the most powerful speeches he has ever given utterance to. 
As a true son of the South Dr. Lee rendered homage and did 
full justice to the memory of the man in whose honor the occasion 
was, without necessity for traversing the traditions of his own 
people. 

Trinity's choir, composed of some of the most excellent voices 
in the city, offered an excellent program. The audience joined 
with them in the singing of "My Country 'Tis of Thee," which 
was the concluding number on the program. 

A rising vote of thanks was tendered Dr. Lee, upon conclusion 
of his address on Lincoln, on the motion of Dr. M. J. Cofer. — 
Journal. 



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IN TRIBUTE Tu LLWuLN TUKMEK FOEMEN JOIN. 



Veterans of Blue and Gray Overflow Trinity Church In 

Celebration of War President's Centennial 

Anniversary. 



Several hundred pei"sons were turned away from Trinity 
church Sunday evening, prevented by lack of space from attend- 
ing the most unique seiTiee of its kind ever held in Atlanta, when 
the veterans Avho wore the blue and the veterans who wore the 
gray united in fraternal coniraenioration of the birth anniversary 
of the man who has been called "The greatest human of all time." 

Leading participants in this remarkable gathering had been 
prominent iy airayed on both sides of the great Civil stniggle of 
more than two score years ago, while from the rank and file 
of their followers came hundreds of men who had honestly dif- 
fered and manfully fought in that mighty war. Under one 
flag now, they came together to render fitting honor to the mem- 
ory of the man who guided the destinies of the Union through 
its most trj'ing period, the martyred wai* President, Abraham 
Linc(iln. 

And the leaders who contributed to the weight and solemnity 
of the occasion were worthy of the distinction carried by their 
selection. 1). I. Carson, Chaplain of 0. M. Mitchel Post No. 1, 
Grand Aniiy of the Republic, presided over the ceremonies with 
all the dignity of the occasion. Drs. Sherrill and Lee conducted 
the Scriptural portion of the exei'cises in a most impressive man- 
ner, while the magnificent address of the latter was the feature 
of the irueting. Then there was General Clement A. Evans, com- 
mander-in-chief United Confederate /Veterans, whose militan,- 
record is pail of the history of Southern heroism, and following 
his prayer came the reading of Mr. Lincoln's favorite poem by 
Colonel Thomj)S()n Hardin Jones, poet, musician and soldier of 
the highest type, the veteran cavalryman who has the unique dis- 
tinction of having sened under the four great cavalry leadei*s of 
the Confederacy, Stuart, Morgan, Forrest and Wheeler. The 

14 



"Gettysburg Address," said to be the masterpiece of the language, 
was read by Brigadier General A. J. Scully, United States army, 
retired, who was on the train that carried Lincoln from Baltimore 
to Gettysburg on the occasion of his delivering the address, and 
who saw the President writing what is believed to have been the 
first draft of the famous discourse. 

A suitable musical progTam was delightfully rendered by a 
choir selected for the event, and the entire audience united in 
singing "My Countiy 'Tis of Thee" as a closing testimony of the 
unity of spirit so wonderfully evidenced by the meeting. 

Dr. Lee's Address. 

The address by Eev. Dr. J. W. Lee, pastor of the church, was 
an unusually beautiful tribute to the character of Lineohi, and 
was heard with interest by the men to whom the yeai's have 
brought a better conception of the personality of the great 
President. — Georgian. 

The Georgian also printed Dr. Lee's address in 
full. 



THE PROCEEDINGS. 

The service began promptly at 7 :30, with an organ 
Prelude- Variations on "The Suwanee Kiver" 
(Flagler), by Mr. Charles A. Sheldon, Jr., organist 
and musical director of Trinity Church, followed by 
the anthem "Praise the Lord" (Randegger), by the 
choir of the church, Miss Rubie Brook, Soprano; 
Mrs. Arthur Creviston, Alto; Mr. R. D. Armour, 
Tenor ; Mr. Joseph Hubbard, Bass. 

The Chaieman : Ladies and gentlemen, friends, 
fellow citizens: We are met on a solemn and dis- 
tinguished and inspiring occasion. Under an order 
from the general headquarters of the Grand Army 
of the Eepublic, a committee of 0. M. Mitchel Post 
of this city has prepared a program, and we have 
received the hearty and enthusiastic cooperation of 
our friends in the camps of Confederate Veterans. 
They have seemed not only glad to participate in 
this occasion, but glad of an occasion to bring us all 
together. 

The occurrence of the one hundredth anniversary 
of the birth of Abraham Lincoln has profoundly 
impressed the entire nation, but among the thou- 
sands of commemorative meetings, doubtless there is 
not another just like this in which the men who in 
Mr. Lincoln's life- time were arrayed against each 

17 



otiier, are united liarinoniously and enthusiastically 
to do honor to his memory. 

This meeting is a testimony to the loyalty and good 
faith of the men of Atlanta. It shows that we * ' look 
up and not down, forward and not back, and lend a 
hand" to the promotion of progress and peace and 
good will in all the nation, and that we "keep step 
to the music of the Union;" and it piles a little 
higher the earth on top of the buried hatchet. 

We will all rise, and sing three verses of hymn No. 
383, "Onward, Christian Soldiers," first, second and 
third verses. 

Onward, Christian soldiers, 

Marching as to war, 
With the Cross of Jesus 

Going on before. 
Christ, the royal Master, 

Leads against the foe; 
Forward into battle, 

See, liis banners go. 

Like a mighty army, 

Moves the Church of God; 
Brothers, we are treading 

Wliere the saints have trod; 
We are not divided. 

All one body we, 
One in hope and doctrine. 

One in charity. 

Crowns and thrones may perish, 

Kingdoms rise and wane, 
But the Church of Jesus 

Constant will riMnain ; 

18 



Gates of hell can never 

'Gainst that Church prevail; 

We have Christ's own promise, 
And that can not fail. 



The Chairman: The Eev. Dr. Sherrill, Dean of 
Atlanta Theological Seminary, will read a portion of 
Scripture. 

Rev. De. Sherrill : I will read the 46th Psalm. 

1. God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in 
trouble. 

2. Therefore will not we fear, though the earth be removed, 
and though the mountains be carried into the midst of the sea; 

3. Though the waters thereof roar and be troubled, though 
the mountains shake with the swelling thereof. 

4. There is a river, the streams whereof shall make glad the 
city of God, the holy place of the tabernacles of the Most High. 

5. God is in the midst of her; she shall not be moved: God 
shall help her, and that right early. 

6. The heathen raged, the kingdoms were moved: he uttered 
his voice, the earth melted. 

7. The Lord of hosts is with us; the God of Jacob is our 
refuge. 

8. Come, behold the works of the Lord, what desolations he 
hath made in the earth. 

9. He maketh wars to cease unto the end of the earth; he 
breaketh the bow, and cutteth the spear in sunder; he bunieth the 
chariot in the fire. 

19 



10. Be still, and know that I am God : I will be exalted among 
the heathen, I will be exalted in the earth. 

11. The Lord of hosts is with us; the God of Jacob is our 
refuge. 

The Chairman : Everybody in Atlanta, unless he 
is too recent a comer, knows and loves General 
Evans, the distinguished Commander-in-Chief of the 
United Confederate Veterans. He will load us in 
prayer. 

Gen. Evans: 0! Thou who art the God of all 
Nations and Father of all mankind, grant to us the 
spirit of full fellowship with one another in this hour 
of sacred worship. May Thy Name be hallowed in 
the united prayer and praise of all these Thy people. 
Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who 
have trespassed against us, and deliver us from all 
evil thought, feeling, and acts forever. 

Thy Throne, God, is forever and ever. Kings 
and princes fail, and empires pass away, but Thy 
Kingdom can never be moved. May Thy Kingdom 
come, and Thy will be done, on earth as it is in 
heaven. Thy will, God, is our law and Thy love is 
our hope. 

We are grateful to Thee for the gift to us of tliis 
our great country, that we may make it glorious, as 
the abiding place of true liberty, brotherly union, 
and i)ure religion. God grant that in this day of its 
power our Country shall lead all nations into the 
security of righteousness, and the enjoyment of 
happiness. Help us to honor and emulate all that is 

20 



great and good in our history; — and in the lives of 
our forefathers, and of all our illustrious country- 
men who have contributed to our country's great- 
ness, and let this year be made memorable as the 
epoch of perfect patriotic concord among all the 
people of the United States. For Thine is the King- 
dom and the power, and the glory forever. Amen. 

The Chairman : We will sing two verses of hymn 
No. 556, ''Blest be the tie that binds our hearts in 
Christian love," After the singing, the usual even- 
ing offering of this church will be received, without 
further announcement. The church officers will 
please be ready. 



Blest be the tie that binds 
Our hearts in Christian love : 

The fellowship of kindred minds 
Is like to that above. 



Before our Father's throne 

We pour our ardent prayers; 
Our fears, our hopes, our aims are one, 

Our comforts and our cares. 

During the taking of the offering, the choir ren- 
dered the anthem, "Now the Day is Over." (Shelly). 

The Chairman: Everyone knows that the poem 
beginning ' ' Oh, Why Should the Spirit of Mortal be 
Proud," was a favorite of Mr. Lincoln's, and it is 

21 



deemed fitting that it should constitute a number in 
the program on such an occasion as this. It will be 
read by a gentleman who was a gallant officer on 
the Staff of General John B. Gordon and General 
Stephen 1). Lee, who is now our highly regarded 
fellow-citizen, Colonel Thompson Ilardin Jones, of 
Camp A, Wheeler's Cavalry; and also of Atlanta 
Camp 159, Confederate Veterans. 

CoL. T. H. Jones: It may be ajipropriate to the 
occasion before reading the favorite poem of Mr. 
Lincoln, that I should recite an incident which trans- 
pired in my own experience in the last days of the 
sixties. 

On March 24th, 1865, I was captured while on a 
scout inside the Federal lines and carried to Clarks- 
ville, Tenn., where I was held as a prisoner until in 
June following the closing of the war in May. 

I have no complaint to make of my imprisonment, 
as I was treated kindly and humanely by my captors, 
and had many more privileges allowed me than 
might have been expected under the circumstances. 
The Sergeant of the prison guard was from Illinois, 
and a neighbor and friend of Mr. Lincoln. He was 
])articularly kind to me, and we often discussed very 
freely from our respective points of view the merits 
of the great struggle and of our leaders. One morn- 
ing he burst into my room with horror and grief 
written on his face and cried out: "The President 
is dead; ^Ir. Lincoln was assassinated at a theater 
in Washington last night!" 

22 



*' Impossible!" I exclaimed, "What coward could 
have committed such a dastardly and horrible 
deed?" 

After a moment of thought he suddenly said: ''Do 
you believe the Confederate Government or the 
South had anything to do with this ? ' ' 

Promptly and indignantly I repudiated the sug- 
gestion, and told him with some warmth that he knew 
such an act was not in keeping with the high sense 
of honor, character and courage of the South. He 
agreed with me after a moment, and we decided that 
the crime must have been committed by some crank 
or crazy fanatic. But I will never forget how, as he 
was leaving me, he paused at the door and lifting his 
hand impressively as he turned, said: "The South 
has lost the best friend she had in the North, and 
one who could and would have done more to help 
her in time of need than any one else in the world." 
And in my heart I could not but feel that he was 
right. 

Looking back over the past tonight through the 
long vista of years with all the trials and triumphs 
of a reunited country, I can but feel that had Mr. 
Lincoln lived the South would have been spared 
much of the horror and distress of the dark days of 
the reconstruction period. 

Mr. Lincoln was preeminently a good and a great 
man, loving his fellow man, and loving his country 
above all, as was indicated in the story told of his 
notable conference with Alexander H. Stephens of 

23 



the Confederacy wlien after long discussion as to 
some satisfactory basis for adjustment of dilTerences 
and final termination of the war without further 
bloodshed, Mr. Lincoln said, pointing to the paper 
that lay on a table: "Let me write UNION at the 
head of that paper, and you may write anything 
you please beneath it." Whether this is a true story 
or not, it serves to illustrate his all-absorbing devo- 
tion to the Union. 

Through all Mr. Lincoln's kind and tender nature 
I'an a strain of melancholy and deep religious senti- 
ment, as indicated by his choice of his favorite poem, 
which I will now present to you. 



Oh ! why should the spirit of mortal be proud? 
Like a s>vift flitting meteor, a fast flying cloud, 
The flash of the lightning, a break of the wave, 
He passes from life to his rest in the grave. 

The leaves of the oak and the willow shall fade, 
Be scattered around and together be laid; 
And the young and the old and the low and the high 
Shall moulder to dust and together shall lie. 

The infant a mother attended and loved, 
The mother that infant's alTection who proved, 
The husband that mother and infant who blest, 
Each, all are away to their dwellings of rest. 

The maid on whose cheek, on whose brow, in whose eye, 
Shone beauty and pleasure, her triumphs are by ; 
And the mem'i-y of those? who loved her and praised 
Are alike from the minds of the living erased. 

24 



The hand of the king that the scepter hath borne, 
The brow of the priest that the miter hath worn, 
The eye of the sage and the heart of the brave 
Are hidden and lost in the depths of the grave. 

The peasant whose lot was to sow and to reap, 
The herdsman who climbed with his goats up the steep, 
The beggar who wandered in search of his bread, 
Have faded away like the grass that we tread. 

The saint who enjoyed the communion of heaven. 
The sinner who dared to remain unforgiven. 
The wise and the foolish, the guilty and just, 
Have quietly mingled their bones in the dust. 

So the multitude goes like the flower or the weed 
That withers away to let others succeed, 
So the multitude comes, even those we behold, 
To repeat evei-y tale that has often been told. 

For we are the same that our fathers have been; 
We see the same sights our fathers have seen; 
We drink the same streams, and view the same sun. 
And run the same course our fathers have run. 

The thoughts we are thinking our fathers would think. 
From the death we are skrinking our fathers would shrink ; 
To the life we are clinging they also would cling, 
But it speeds from us all like a bird on the wing. 

They loved, but the stoi-y we can not unfold; 
They scorned, but the heart of the haughty is cold; 
They grieved, but no wail from their slumber will come; 
They joyed, but the tongue of their gladness is dumb. 

They died, ay, they died. We things that are now, 
That walk on the tiu-f that lies over their brow. 
And make in their dwellings a transient abode. 
Meet the things that they met on their pilgrimage road. 

25 



Yea, hope and despondency, pleasure and pain. 
Are Boinglcd together in sunshine and rain ; 
And the smile and the tear, the song and the dirge, 
Still follow each other like surge upon surge. 



'Tis the wink of an eye, 'tis the draught of a breath, 
From the blossom of health to the paleness of death. 
From the gilded salon to the bier and the shroud — 
Oh, why should the spirit of mortal he proud? 



The Chaieman : A particular interest in my mind 
attaches to a man who knew Mr. Lincoln, or who 
even saw him. I used to look with something like 
reverence on a venerable neighbor in my former 
place of residence, who was present at Cooper 
Union, in New York, in February, 1860, forty-nine 
years ago, and heard the famous ''Cooper Union 
Speech," which did so much toward making Mr. 
Lincoln president. I voted for Mr. Lincoln at his 
second election, but I never saw him in life. 

You may therefore fancy the thrill of interest I 
feel, when I tell you that there sits on this platform, 
a gentleman who, as a young army officer, was in 
the car with Mr. Lincoln going from Washington 
to Gettysburg, in November, 1863, and saw him write, 
and then sat near him, and heard him deliver that 
immortal world-classic which we know as the 
''Gettysburg Address." He will now read that 
address: Brigadier-General J. W. Scully, United 
States Army, retired. 

26 



General, Scully: 
Fellow Veterans, Ladies and Gentlemen: 

As Comrade Carson has told you, I did ride in 
the same car with President Lincoln, though not 
from Washington, as he says, but from Baltimore^ 
to Gettysburg. Comrade Carson also remarked that 
I was a ''young officer at the time. I certainly was 
a young man, but I held the rank of Lieutenant- 
Colonel, and was designated by the Military Gover- 
nor of Tennessee, on whose staff I then was, to 
represent him on that occasion. I met the Presi- 
dent's train at Baltimore, and there General Robert 
C. Schenck, who then commanded the Military 
Department in wliich Gettysburg was situated, at- 
tached me to his staff. I was introduced to the 
President, and rode in his car to Gettysburg. 

Now, it has been said and written, over and over 
again, that Mr. Lincoln did not write that address 
while on the way ; and in fact prominent personages 
have denied that he wrote it at all; but while a 
hundred, or more, may not have seen him write it, 
their testimony is altogether negative; but I know 
that at least half a dozen did see him write it, and 
of whom I ivas one. I saw him take a pad from the 
hand of some one; sit down in his "state room;" 
and write something that he held in his hand ivhile 
delivering that speech. 

During the ceremonies at Gettysburg, I sat right 
in front of him, not over thirty feet from the plat- 

27 



form, and well do I remember bis appearance as he 
apprbacbed the front: that tall, ungainly figure; that 
sad expression of countenance that Colonel Jones 
just told you about; those long arms; those large 
hands, folded and clasping a scrap of paper that he 
never looked at during the delivery of that remark- 
able oration. It made an impression on me that has 
lasted to this hour. 

Often since then I have applied to that occasion 
those beautiful lines of Lady Wilde : 

"On his brow a mighty doom, 
Be it grandeur, be it gloom, 

The shadow of a Crown it was wearing!" 

It may be noted here, and probably remembered 
by historical readers, that all the great Emanci- 
pators in history met tragical deaths: Moses was 
''taken to where no man knoweth, even unto this 
day"; Spartacus, who freed the slaves of Rome, was 
afterwards slain on the field of battle; Jesus, who 
emancipated the minds, the thoughts, the Souls of 
humanity, died ob Calvary's Cross; Alexander of 
Russia, who struck the shackles off hundreds of 
thousands of serfs, was slain by a bomb, thrown by 
the hand of one of the very people whom he had 
emancipated; and Abraham Lincoln was killed by 
a crazy actor, a professional ''Tragedian," who had 
not a scintilla of reason, or cause, for that atrocious 
act, his last tragedy. 

Speaking of Crowns, I may be permitted to quote 
from your "Poet Priest" of the South — the author 

28 



of "The Conquered Banner" — : "Croivns of Roses 
Fade, Croicns of Thorns Endure; Calvaries and 
Crucifixes take Deepest Hold upon the Chronicles of 
Nations!" So, the bullet that sped from the pistol 
of John AVilkes Booth, placed a Crowist upon the 
brow of Abraham Lincoln that will never be 
removed while Liberty lives, or while Literature 
lasts. The Crown of Immortality ! 

I shall now read the ** Gettysburg Address." 

Four score and seven years ago oiir fathers brought forth on 
this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to 
the proposition that all men are created equal. Now we are en- 
gaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any 
nation so conceived and so dedicated, caii long endure. We are 
met on a great battlefield of that war. We have come to dedicate 
a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here 
gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether 
fitting and proper that we should do this; but, in a larger sense, 
we can not dedicate — we can not consecrate — we can not hallow — 
this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, 
have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. 
The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, 
but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us, the 
living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which 
they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is 
rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining 
before us — that from these honored dead we take increased devo- 
tion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of 
devotion — that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not 
have died in vain — that this nation, under God, shall have a new 
birth of freedom — and that government of the people, by the 
people, for the people shall not perish from the earth. 

29 



The Chairman : We come now to the Oration on 
Abraham Lincoln. From one point of view, it seems 
absurd for me to rise in this place to introduce Dr. 
Lee to an Atlanta audience. His father was a gallant 
Georgia soldier through the war, in Gen. Colquitt's 
command, but I believe there is no man in Atlanta 
so well qualified by the character of his mind, and 
by special studies, to speak upon this topic, as the 
distinguished and beloved citizen who is the pastor 
of Trinity Methodist Church. I count it an honor 
and a privilege to present to you, the Reverend 
James W. Lee, Doctor of Divinity. 

Dr. Lee: 

''All things work together for good to them who 
love God, to them who are called according to His 
purpose." — Romans xiii, 28. 

In liis essay on German literature, Thomas Car- 
lyle declares that ''There is a divine idea pervading 
the visible universe; wliich visible universe is indeed 
but its symbol and sensible manifestation, having in 
itself no meaning or even true existence independent 
of it. To the mass of men tliis divine idea lies 
hidden; yet to discern it and seize it and live wholly 
in it is the condition of all genuine virtue, knowledge, 
freedom and the end, therefore, of all s]>i ritual effort 
in every age." 

This is the interjiretation given by a master in 
literature of the words of the text. The machinery 
of the universe works for good to all those who 

30 



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1 




Ff 


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Mi 


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discern and seize and wholly live in the divine idea 
at its heart. Here we have a principle by which to 
account for the continuous activity and influence of 
every great man in history. The universal order 
publishes larger and larger editions of the men who 
discern and seize and wholly live in the divine idea 
history is gradually unfolding. Because of this, 
newly-bound copies of Abraham and Moses and 
Isaiah and St. Paul are issued by the wheel work 
of the centuries for the readers of every passing age. 
Those who are the called according to His purpose 
are such as yield to the pressure of the eternal 
intention of the Almighty and expend their spiritual 
efforts in the direction it urges. 

1. The contemporaries of a distinguished man 
can not know the place he is to take in history. They 
are too close to him to see all there is of him if he 
loe really great, and too near to quite measure liis 
diminutiveness if his prominence be due to the acci- 
dents of external estate or official jDOsition. A time 
exposure of nearly eight centuries was required for 
Sabatier to get the picture he took of St. Francis and 
published in his ''Life of St. Francis of Assisi." 

The clods that fall upon their graves close the 
careers of the rank and file of men. It is only now 
and then that one of our race appears on the planet 
with wealth of being stored in his soul too great to 
be locked inside a tomb, who lives again, not only in 
■eternity, but throughout all time: 

31 



"In minds made better by their presence, live 
In pulses stirred to generosity, 
In deeds of daring rectitude, in scorn 
Of miserable aims that end with self, 
In thouglits sublime that pierce the night-like stars, 
And with their mild persistence urge man's search 
To vaster issues." 

Such a man was Abraham Lincoln. 

2. His mortal remains were consigned to their 
last resting place forty-four years ago, but the fur- 
ther away we get from the day of his funeral and 
from the few feet of ground enriched by his sleeping 
dust, the more clearly is it understood that there was 
little of Lincoln John Wilkes Booth was able to kill, 
and a very small part of him his loved ones were 
able to bury, 

Lincoln belonged to that class of men who learn 
in consecrated service the secret of the resurrection, 
and who discover and practice the method of finding 
themselves for this world and the next, by losing 
themselves before they cease to breathe. Lincoln 
did not wait for the judgment trump of the last day 
to call him from the dead. While alive in the flesh, 
he conformed to eternal principles and by them was 
transformed into an incorruptible citizen of all the 
ages. 

3. Not by any process of analysis can one deter- 
mine the ])articular gift, or power, or accomplish- 
ment, it was in Lincoln that won for him the favor 
of the years. It is well known that time can neither 
be flattered nor bribed. Not without good reason 

32 



are favors shown this mortal or that by the tearless 
order of the flying suns. When the centuries are 
found conspiring to augment the worth and fame 
of a man, it may be known absolutely, that he was 
of value, beyond the capacity of the time in which 
he lived to express. It is the habit of the universe, 
always and everywhere, to mete out to every one 
exact justice. When, therefore, we see the invest- 
ment a person makes of himself in his own age, 
constantly drawing large installments of interest in 
succeeding times, we may know that he failed to get 
all that was due him while he lived. The contem- 
poraries of Bruno did not appreciate him sufficiently 
to grant him standing room during his natural life. 
They burnt him on the Campo dei Fiori in the city of 
Rome. But in 400 years, the life capital he left had 
so increased in value that his countrymen found the 
amount large enough to build liim a monument, which 
now stands in the neighborhood of the spot from 
which he started to heaven in a chariot of flame four 
centuries ago. 

4. Abraham Lincoln has grown more during the 
years that have elapsed since he was assassinated 
than any other man of all history ever did in a half 
century after his death. It took 400 years in the 
case of Bruno to convert his pyre into his monu- 
ment, but it has taken only fifty years in the case of 
Lincoln to convert the bullet of his assassin into 
many shafts of marble, and into as many monuments 

33 



of affection as there are hearts beating in the breasts 
of civilized human beings. 

5. How are we to account for this subtle, in- 
tangible, growing personal reality, rising round us 
like an atmosphere, we represent to ourselves by the 
name of Lincoln? It was not his statesmanship. 
Hamilton was a more brilliant master of the struc- 
ture and functions of goverament. It was not his 
oratory. He never reached the level of magnetic 
speech perpetually maintained by Webster. It was 
not simply his gift of boundless common sense. In 
this respect, Benjamin Franklin was his equal. It 
was not liis devotion to the cause of abolition simply. 
Wendell Phillips and William Lloyd Garrison did 
more to create and direct the moral conviction that 
gave to the slaves their freedom. It was not merely 
because he was the chief executive of the re]niblic 
during the stormiest period of the national history, 
and managed to conduct it through the most terrific 
civil war ever waged. There were others who might 
have guided the ship of state through the storms that 
imperiled its existence. We must look dee))er than 
his words, deeper than his deeds, deejier than the 
official position he held, to find the source of Lincoln. 

6. In the words of the text, ''All things work 
together for good to them that love God," and in 
the interpretation of these words by Carlyle, we find 
the ])rinciple by the aid of which we can account for 
Lincoln, and for every other man whose name the 
passing ages can not blot from the memory of our 

34 



race. Whoever in any age discerns and seizes and 
wholly lives in the divine idea history is unfolding 
insures the publication of himself in larger and 
larger volumes with every clearer and completer 
expression of that idea. 

7. Plato discerned and seized and wholly lived 
in the divine idea it is the function of philosophy 
to interpret, hence speculative thinkers for twenty- 
five centuries have kept his work fresh in the memory 
of thoughtful men. Copernicus wholly lived in the 
divine idea expressed in the constellations, and 
henceforth the morning stars can never sing to- 
gether without magnifying the glory of his genius. 
Darwin, born the same year, the same month and 
the same day with Lincoln, identified himself wholly 
with the divine idea expressed in the method of 
creation, hence all nature, through its flowers and 
through its birds, will never cease to fill the sky with 
perfume and melody in honor of his achievements. 
The divine idea Lincoln wholly lived in was not the 
intellectual aspects of it, with which speculative 
thought is concerned; nor the biological aspects of 
it with which naturalists are concerned; nor the 
mechanical aspects of it with which astronomers are 
concerned; but it was the distinctly human aspect 
of it, with which lovers and martyrs and heroes 
are concerned. The universities will guard the 
fortunes of Plato, the observatories will keep fresh 
the memory of Copernicus; the naturalists will 
take care of the interests of Darwin, but humanity, 

35 



aching, struggling, suffering, despairing, triumi)li- 
ing, will recount to itself over and over again, 
nntil the last jiage of liuman liistory is written, the 
courage, the patience, the ])ity and the sacrifice of 
Lincoln. The poor belated negroes, slaves to petty 
kings in Africa, slaves to humane masters in Amer- 
ica, but nevertheless slaves, until Lincoln, by a stroke 
of the pen, knocked the shackles from off their limbs, 
will never cease, in time or eternity, to lift their 
dark faces in gratitude to him as their savior from 
bondage, 

8. Soldiers in blue, and sohliers in gray, more of 
whom now march amid the hills of day than drag 
their weary feet over the scenes of conflict, are able 
to see, by the light of a larger, sweeter time, terri- 
tory sufficient in the heart of Lincoln for all brave 
men to stand and love, and the armies of Grant and 
the armies of Lee, now, thank God, united on earth 
and united in heaven, will both regard the martyred 
president as their commander-in-chief to all eternity. 
The sections have learned in fifty years that it is 
])etter to convert their energies into the flying 
shuttles of commerce to weave the people together 
than it is to turn them into minie balls to shoot the 
people apart. No man's future is safer for the time 
to come than that of Abraham Lincoln. He wholly 
lived in the divine idea at the bottom of the American 
union. He identified himself with the central current 
of our national life. We can not move toward the 
fulfillment of our destiny as a j)eople without per- 

36 



petually witnessing the spirit of Lincoln, accompany- 
ing us, like a pillar of cloud by day and a pillar of 
fire by night. The greater we become as a power 
among the nations, the wider becomes the scope of 
our commerce, the stronger becomes our influence 
for unity, world-wide and universal, the greater and 
wider and stronger will become Lincoln, who sought 
in his life to harmonize a divided people, and dying 
left a legacy of sympathy and tenderness and sacri- 
fice which, by its "mild persistence," has reunited 
forever in the bonds of undying love the members 
of the national household. 

9. It would not be true to say that Lincoln was 
superior in this or that respect to all other men 
who lived in our country between the years of 1809 
and 1865, But it is true that he, more than any other, 
charged with the responsibility of national affairs, 
did discern and seize and wholly live in the divine 
idea it seems to be the purpose of Providence to 
realize through these United States. It was his 
complete conformity to the central purpose of this 
nation, as he had light to see it, that gives him his 
unique and growing place in history. 

10. The men for whose good the machinery of the 
universe works and whose lives it republishes with 
every revolution of its wheels, are not always the 
strongest men in intellectual endowment or adminis- 
trative ability. Nero had, perhaps, as much or 
more native ability than Saint Paul, but Nero threw 
himself across the purpose of God, and was ground 

37 



to powder by it, wliile Saint Paul directed his life 
parallel with it, and hence lives in larger and larger 
measures with the gradual unfolding of the divine 
purpose. Napoleon was a much greater force than 
Wellington, but Napoleon was left discomfited and 
broken by the roadway of events, while Wellington 
was chosen to move on down the years at the head 
of his invincible columns. Herbert Spencer had 
intellectual ability equal to that of Hegel, but the 
English thinker built his system across the track 
of advancing thought, and had the sorrow of seeing 
it smashed by the engine of things, before he died, 
while the German thinker, lifting up his system 
parallel with the universal order, and hitched to the 
purpose at its center, will enjoy the happiness of 
perpetually teaching the human mind. 

11. It often happens that the noblest men dis- 
cern and seize and wholly live in an idea they take 
to be divine, but which, when subjected to the test 
of time, turns out to lead away from the track of 
history. The real test, therefore, of the greatness 
of one who has played a prominent part on the stage 
of human affairs, is this : how completely did ho dis- 
cern and build upon an idea moving toward realiza- 
tion in the eternities. A great and consecrated man 
may choose a promising idea, and upon it as a foun- 
dation, build of gold, or silver, or precious stones, 
or wood, or hay, or stubble, but inevitably the day of 
Judgment comes, and then his work is made manifest, 
for the day shall declare it. Every man's work is 

38 



tried, and it is known in every ease, finally, of what 
sort it is. If a man's work abide which he hath built 
upon an eternal foundation, he shall receive a reward, 
both for his work and for the wisdom that guided 
him in choosing the right idea upon which to build. 
But if a good man's work shall be burnt because 
built on a wrong idea, he shall suffer the loss of all 
his effort in the performance of that work, but he 
himself shall be saved yet so as by fire. Lincoln's 
work has stood the tests of fifty years of judgment 
days. It has been revealed through fire of what 
sort it was and is. He is now being rewarded both 
for his work and for the insight that led him to 
build on an eternal foundation. Those of us who 
left the union fifty years ago were just as good and 
great and consecrated as were those who remained 
in it. Our works, too, were of gold, and silver, and 
precious stones, but the idea we selected as a foun- 
dation upon which to build was not moving in the 
track of events. Our Southern Confederacy has 
been burnt, but the patriotism, devotion, consecra- 
tion, which took form in its fading and passing for- 
tunes, are forever safe. So great are we as a peo- 
ple that it has taken only fifty sad, heart-rending 
years, to bring us to a national level of good will, 
upon which it is in the hearts of all to give to the 
Confederates the same praise for their loyalty to 
what they believe to be right, and to cover their 
graves with flowers as deeply beautiful, as to those 

39 



wiio foiii^lit on the side of victory and in the direc- 
tion of tlie idea the God of history is unfolding. 

Tlie people of tliis country, North and South, have 
come to a point of view, liigh enougli above the level 
of fifty years ago to appreciate the good and great 
men on both sides of the question that separated 
them once into contending armies. Think of a 
service like this tonight, held in a city that was 
burned to the ground forty-five years ago l^y order 
of the commander-in-chief of the P^'ederal army, 
wliose memory we meet liere to lionor. Nothing 
like it before ever took place in all history. It is 
a strange and a great thing under the sun. To what 
unexpected heights is this movement toward frater- 
nity and affection to move? How much higher are 
the waters of good will to rise? If they continue to 
climb they will finally reach the shores upon which 
New York and Boston are situated, so that a 
memorial service in honor of Jefferson Davis will 
be held in those quarters, where they once hated Mr. 
Davis as thoroughly as we did Mr. Lincoln. Let the 
waves of fraternity swell, until they shall cover 
every patch of territory and island that separated us. 

Theodore Roosevelt, half Georgian and half 
Dutchman, now the best loved president who has 
occupied his exalted position since Washington, 
when a young man, referred to JelTerson Davis as 
the arch traitor, but recently upon his return from 
a hunting trip in Louisiana, congratulated the peo- 
ple of Mississippi for contributing to the country 

40 



the illustrious name of Jefferson Davis, and praised 
them for the honors they had conferred upon that 
great man. 

Charles Francis Adams, only a short time ago, 
made the frank statement that he was for a long 
time too prejudiced to read the life of Mr. Davis, 
but, finally, being led to do so, he declared that he 
found his character without a blemish. 

The difference between Abraham Lincoln and Jef- 
ferson Davis was not that they were not both good 
and great men, but the difference is that Mr. Lin- 
coln took passage on a ship that will sail the seas 
of time forever, while Mr. Davis made the mistake 
of getting aboard a vessel that was wrecked, because 
out of the course mapped by Providence, as the 
destined way for the people of this country to 
voyage. 

When the Confederates left the sinking Confed- 
eracy and walked up the gangway back into the 
magnificent ship upon wliicli all our people began 
the voyage to the future, the great captain was cold 
in death, but had he been alive he would have shared 
his last dollar and his last drop of heart's blood 
with the brave men who had been sailing in perilous 
seas, but who at length were coming back to the 
vessel we will all sail in to the shores of eternity. 

In his '' Reminiscences of the Civil War" General 
John B. Gordon relates a touching] y beautiful inci- 
dent, illustrative of the feelings, deep down in their 
hearts, common to the soldiers of both the Union 

41 



and Confederate Armies. Once, on opposite sides 
of the Rapidan River, Northern and Southern 
troops were encamped. As no orders were coming 
from those in command of the contending forces 
for an exchange of lead, the plain soldiers of the 
two armies began to hurl from one side to the other 
notes of their favorite songs. The engagement in 
sentiment was opened by breaking the stillness of 
the April twilight from the Northern side of the 
river with the strains of "Hail Columbia, Happy 
Land." In response to this volley of emotion, fired 
from brave hearts in blue, the air was set to vibrat- 
ing from the Southern bank of the river by the 
thrilling words of ''Dixie" thrown from the throats 
in gray. 

Then a lone volunteer, with chords in his soul 
which songs from neither bank of the Rapidan had 
seemingly touched, lifted up his voice in the immor- 
tal words of "Home, Sweet Home," when the men 
of both armies, as if moved from heaven, forgot all 
points of the national compass, and without refer- 
ence to who was right or who was wrong, to flags of 
truce, or terms of surrender, re-established the 
Union on the spot, by getting together in the section- 
less music of John Howard Payne's spirit. Little 
did those brave men think, fifty years ago, when 
their voices were reverberating through the Vir- 
ginia liills to the tune of "Home, Sweet Home," 
that they were not only filling the sky with melody, 

42 



but also with prophecy, which those of us who meet 
here tonight have hved to see fulfilled. 

''Hail Columbia" is now domesticated in the 
South, and "Dixie" is tumultuously at home in the 
North, and both songs have been purified from all 
sectional flavor through the wondrous alembic of 
good will. 

*'We are all back in the home of our fathers," in 
the langTiage of Mr. Benjamin H. Hill, "and we are 
here to stay forever." 

The choir rose spontaneously and sang, "Home, 
Sweet Home." 

'Mid pleasures and palaces though we may roam, 

Be it ever so humble, there's no place like home ! 

A charm from the skies seems to hallow us there, 

Which, seek thi'ough the world, is ne'er met with elsewhere. 

Home ! home ! sweet, sweet home ! 
There's no place like home; there's no place like home. 

An exile from home splendor dazzles in vain. 

Oh ! give me my lowly, thateh'd cottage again ; 

The birds singing gaily, that come at my call; 

Give me them, with the peace of mind, dearer than all. 

How sweet 'tis to sit 'neath a fond father's smile. 
And the cares of a mother to sootfie and beguile. 
Let others delight 'mid new pleasures to roam, 
But give me, oh ! give me the pleasures of home. 

To thee I'll return, over-burdened with care. 
The heart's dearest solace will smile on me there; 
No more from that cottage again will I roam, 
Be it ever so humble, there's no place like home. 

43 



Dr. M. J. Cofer, of Camp 10!), and chaplain of 
the Georgia State Division, Confederate Veterans, 
rose in his place about the center of the house and 
said, "Mr. Chairman, on behalf of the Gray, I move 
that a vote of thanks be tendered by this audience 
to Rev. Dr. Lee for the wise, patriotic and religious 
address to which we have just listened." Mr. C. R. 
Haskins, of the Grand Army Post, rose to second 
the motion on behalf of the Blue. 

Tlie motion was unanimously carried by a rising 
vote. 

The Chairman: No. 702, "My Country, 'tis of 
Thee." I think we can sing this hymn as we never 
sang it before. Afterward the benediction will be 
pronounced by General Evans. 



My country 'tis of thee, 
Sweet land of liberty, 

Of thee I sing; 
Land where my fathers died! 
Land of the Pilgrim's pride ! 
From every mountain side 

Let freedom ring! 



My native country thee — 
Land of the noble, free — 

Thy name I love; 
I love thy rocks and rills, 
Thy woods and templed hills; 
My heart with rapture thrills 

Like that above. 

44 



Let music swell the breeze, 
And ring from all the trees 

Sweet freedom's song: 
Let mortal tongues awake; 
Let all that breathe partake; 
Let rocks their silence break,- 

The sound prolong. 

Our fathers' God ! to thee, 
Author of liberty. 

To thee we sing: 
Long may our land be bright 
With freedom's holy light ; 
Protect us by thy might, 

Great God, our King ! 



Benediction. 



General Evans: Lord, dismiss us with Thy 
blessing so that we may go away with our minds 
and hearts filled with love for one another — love for 
our country, and love for our God. Amen. 

Organ postlude — Variations on ''America" 
(Rink), Mr. Charles A. Sheldon, Jr. 



45 



SUPPLEMENTARY. 

The Lincoln memorial meeting reported in this 
pamphlet has attracted wide attention and many 
letters have been received by Kev. Dr. Lee in regard 
to it. The Springfield Republican reprints the sub- 
stance of the report in the Georgian and almost the 
whole of Dr. Lee's address. 

A very remarkable and interesting expression is 
in a letter from the son of President Lincoln, which 
is as follows : 

(Copy.) 

Chicago, III., February 20, 1909. 
60 Lake Shore Drive. 

The Rev. James W. Lee, D. D., 
Atlanta, Ga. 

My dear Sir: 

I thank you vciy heartily for your kindness in sending me the 
report of the memorial service in Trinity church upon the anni- 
versary of my father's birth. None of the occurrences of last 
week have affected me so much as this meeting, as an indication 
of the realization of the hopes which I think guided every act 
of his while President. It is dramatic that this proof should 
come from a city destroyed by one of the armies under his supreme 
command, and be presented by Confederate soldiers, listening 
with approval to an address of such eloquence and patriotic feel- 
ing as yours. As his son, I am veiy grateful for the meeting, 
and more than grateful for your distinguished part in it. 

As General Scully spoke of the Gettysburg address and of the 
circumstances under which he thought it was written, I think you 
will be interested in knowing the facts about it, as related by my 
father's secretary, Mr. Nicolay, and I am therefore sending to 
you a re-print of an article written by Mr. Nicolay in 1S!)4. 
From it you will see that my father probably \vi-ote a short ad- 

46 



dress before the beginning of the journey and only changed it 
slightly just before its delivery. I think it improbable that he 
could have secured a minute to himself in his car filled with 
people even to reflect as to his words for the next day. Renew- 
ing to you the assurances of my grateful feelings, I am, 

Very sinceely yours, 

(Signed) Robert T. Lincoln. 

The following is from Rev. Dr. Rhodes, Pastor of 
St. Mark's Evangelical Lutheran Church of St. 
Louis, and member of the International Sunday 
School Lesson Committee. 

(Copy.) 

St. Louis, Mo., February 22nd, 1909. 
4444 Washington Boulevard. 

My dear Dr. Lee : 

I thank you most heartily for the Lincoln address. I have 
read it with deepest interest. I have seen nothing on the great 
and good Lincoln that makes any approach to your own mas- 
terly effort. For original thought, wise discrimination, far-reach- 
ing insight into God's great world-purpose, and wonderful inter- 
pretation of the philosophy of God's working in the world, it 
stands alone. This is not visionary, but my calm judgment. It 
is entirely too valuable a production to be lost. It should be put 
into permanent form. Its value is increased because it is from a 
Southern man. I saw Lincoln after he was dead. Of course, I 
voted for him first and last and had an almost passionate admira- 
tion for him. How marvelously God works. I long for your 
return, dear brother, you were naughty for leaving me when the 
■evening is falling about me. Love and God's blessing to you and 
yours. Most sincerely, 

(Signed) M. Rhodes. 

The following is from a member of LaFayette 
Post G. A. R. in New York City to Col. W. M. Scott 
of 0. M. Mitchel Post : 

47 



New York, Februarj' 20, 190'J. 
Cox.. W. M. Scott, 

Atlanta, Ga. 

My dear Colonel : 

I am in receipt of your package containing Atlanta paper of 
Febniary 15tli. I think the address by Dr. Lee is one of the 
finest things I ever read, and thank you very much for sending 
me the paper. New York was full of the Lincoln celebration on 
the 12th, but there was nothing I heard that was as grand as 
Dr. Lee's talk. The same spirit prevails in the North that seems 
to be advancing in the South. I think the "Blue" and the "Gray" 
will march tc)gether on Memorial Day in New York the same as 
in other places. Remember me as ever, 

Your sincere friend, 

Albert B. Yorhis. 

From Ex-Governor Van Sant of Minnesota : 

St. Petersburg, Fla., February 24, 1909. 
Dear Comrade: 

• * * Y'es, we are a united people now, and I am much 
pleased to see the people of the South so patriotic. • • * 

Cordially, S. R. Van Sant. 

Prom General Louis Wagner, President Third 
National Bank, Philadelphia : 

Philadelphia, Februai^ IS, 1909. 
W. Af. Scott, Esq., 

Atlanta, Ga. 
Dear Sir and Comrade: 

Many thanks for the copy of The Atlanta Georgian and News 
of the 15th instant, with marked article entitled: "In Tribute 
to Lincoln, Former Foemen Join," which you have kindly sent me. 
You had a profitable gathering in connection with the celebration 
of the Lincoln Centennial. 

Y'ours tinily, Louis Wagner. 

Many similar letters liave been received. 

48 



of tife lirtlf of 

(Eommetnoratiitc ^crttites 
Atlanta, ©corpia. 



